For years, Chelsea fans have been taunted and bestowed the unwanted nickname "rent boys" by rival fans. Football is rife with all sorts of insults, bad jokes, rumours and nicknames but being called rent boys must hurt deeply. In case you didn't know, a "rent boy" is an old English term or slang for a young male prostitute, generally of lower-class and cheap for his services. The slang re-emerged in English popular culture around the 1960s and 70s when many young boys in London who were struggling to make ends meet, resulted to sex work as a means to make some money.

So why are Chelsea fans called rent boys? Well, for a number of reasons. One for instance, could be because Earls Court in Chelsea at the time was apparently one of the most popular places to pick up these male prostitutes. Another reason could be because of a rumour that sprang up sometime around the 1980s that a popular Chelsea hooligan was found in bed with a male prostitute or a "rent boy" during a police raid. When Roman Abramovich took over Chelsea Football Club in 2003, the club had a massive influx of money and they began heavily investing in world-class players like Geremi, Damien Duff, Veron, Joe Cole, Crespo, Makelele, Petr Cech, Arjen Robben, Didier Drogba and Robero Carvalho within his first year. That new money angered fans of clubs like Liverpool and Manchester United, more established clubs with more established history. These rival fans insist that the money was the only reason players chose to join Chelsea. As the club became more successful, they gained more fans and rivals began to use the term "rent boys" for the people who started to support Chelsea at the time of Abramovich's takeover to liken these supposed glory hunters to male prostitutes.

So how much did Roman Abramovich's investment transform Chelsea?

Let's call it as it is. Chelsea were in deep shit. They owe Roman Abramovich EVERYTHING. When the Russian billionaire Abramovich bought the Club, they were in financial crisis. He even agreed to take responsibility for the club's £80 million debt as part of the deal and immediately began paying the debt off. He then began investing heavily in the team itself, quickly spending over £100 million on new signings to kick-start an era of big money signings by rich owners in European Football. To further showcase his ambition in turning Chelsea into a powerhouse, Abramovic dismissed Claudio Ranieri for failing to deliver trophies and paid FC Porto £1.7m compensation to land their highly sought after manager, Jose Mourinho who had just won the Champions League. Mourinho was also heavily funded, spending over £70 million in transfer fees on Tiago, Essien, Drogba, Ricardo Carvalho and Paulo Ferreira.

The results were instant. By the end of Mourinho's 2nd season, Chelsea had won back-to-back Premier League titles, an FA Cup and 2 League Cups. The only missing trophy was the Champions League. 8 years later and after more than £860m spent on transfers, Chelsea beat Bayern Munich to lift the Champions League for the first time in their history. Abramovich's most coveted trophy. In all, Chelsea won 16 trophies during Abramovich's era including 5 Premier League and 2 Champions League titles. How much did that cost? £2.1 billion ($2.8 billion) spent on 490 players.

In typical Football shithousery style, the more success Chelsea recorded, the stronger the "rent boys" narrative from rival fans who continue to allege that all that success was down to Abramovich's billions. As if that's a bad thing.

The accusations are not entirely wrong though. Chelsea were hit with a transfer ban in 2019 for shady transfer dealings and for the first time since Abramovich bought the Club, they failed to make a single signing in a transfer window. A 4th placed finish with no trophies won was a big highlighter that Chelsea would most likely be unsuccessfully without their sugar daddy's billions no matter how hard their fans try to deny it.

With Abramovich now gone, it remains to be seen how Chelsea will fare in transfer dealings and success on the pitch. Whilst their new owner Todd Boehly is also wealthy, we will have to wait to see if he's willing and able to match his predecessor's spending habits. If that's not the case, then an interesting season awaits Chelsea, their fans and rivals. You wouldn't put it past them to remain successful post-Abramovich era. Chelsea have a good team, world class players and an excellent manager. A win a draw and a loss in the first 3 games of the season is not exactly convincing, especially the way they fell apart in the devastating loss to Leeds.

This should be Chelsea's moment.. to silence their accusers for good.... or become a shadow of themselves like an unemployable girl that loses her sugar daddy and his financial generosity.